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He cut off the thought, forcing his mind, and his libido, back to the matter at hand—he needed to find a way to redirect her research and prevent her probing again into areas he couldn’t let her go.
‘You asked during our initial interview if you could review Narabia’s ancient scrolls,’ he said, seizing on a possible solution. ‘I have asked Ravi to make them available to you.’ He hadn’t, but he would. ‘They will make a much less compromising focus for your research.’ The documents were the basis for the Narabian constitution, its ancient laws and customs. But there should be nothing in them that could feed back into the subject of his past.
‘Oh, yes... That’s...’ She hesitated, her uncertainty strangely endearing.
He stifled the thought. He’d be wise not to mistake her honesty and transparency for harmlessness again.
‘That would be very helpful,’ she finally managed, her studied politeness doing nothing to mitigate the vivid blush running riot on her skin. ‘Thank you. I look forward to reading them,’ she added, but the passionate interest of moments before had dulled.
He tried not to regret it. With her searching questions,
and her unsolicited sympathy, this woman had come closer than any of the women he had actually slept with to awakening needs which he’d thought he’d buried years before.
He couldn’t risk having that happen again.
The kiss the day before was one thing. The chemistry they shared might well flare out of control again—and he wasn’t quite as averse now to giving it free rein as he had been yesterday.
Physical desire, after all, was easily controlled, and easily forgotten once satisfied.
Catherine Smith captivated him, he might as well admit it—that fascinating mix of intelligence and innocence as irresistible as her live-wire response to his kisses. And she was going to be here for several months. The chances of them being able to keep a lid on the hunger that had flared so easily between them yesterday were slim to none, if he was being realistic. But before he let anything happen between them, he intended to be sure he could control the fallout.
He certainly could not allow her to get this close again to unmasking the weaknesses his father had worked so hard to kill—the neediness, the loneliness, the yearning for support and unconditional love that had crippled him as a boy—because they were the same weaknesses that had left him defenceless and had very nearly destroyed him sixteen years ago.
CHAPTER FIVE
CAT YAWNED AND rubbed her eyes, which had become gritty in the lamplight. Glancing up from the ancient transcripts, her tired gaze focused on the pale moon glittering through the geometric carvings on the shutters that shielded the library’s precious documents from the outside.
Kasia lay on the divan opposite, having fallen asleep not long after they’d finished the evening meal served to them in the library’s antechamber.
Cat stretched her neck, aware for the first time of the kinks that had set in while she’d been studying the scrolls.
She checked the time on her smartphone. Ten o’clock? Goodness, she’d been deciphering the ancient Narabian texts and jotting down notes on the origin of different customs and cultural norms for four hours straight without a break. No wonder her neck felt as if someone had tied it in a knot.
Pushing out a breath, she rolled the parchment, careful to overlay it with the linen used to absorb moisture, and tied it with the ribbon. Stacking it in the ornate chest, she sealed the lid and turned the key.
She’d been studying the scrolls for five days now. And had a wealth of notes to transcribe tomorrow in the office that had been set up for her in the women’s quarters. But she’d done enough for tonight. Kasia needed her bed, and so did she.
After she’d woken her assistant—and friend—they made their way back through the labyrinth of corridors. Perhaps because Kasia had been half-asleep when they’d set off, after walking for twenty minutes, passing through several walled gardens and a series of covered walkways, Cat began to suspect they might have taken a wrong turn.
‘Shouldn’t we have reached the women’s quarters by now?’ she murmured.
Kasia turned in a circle. Two doors, one of which looked ornate and imposing decorated in hammered bronze, stood in front of them. Neither one looked familiar to Cat.
‘I think we are lost...’ Kasia confirmed Cat’s fears, but then pointed to the more lavishly decorated door. ‘But this looks interesting.’ She tried the door, and it opened onto a flight of stairs. She smiled over her shoulder as she headed up the spiral staircase. ‘Let us explore. This is part of the old palace—it will help with your research? No?’
‘Wait, Kasia. We don’t have permission to be here,’ Cat whispered as she followed her friend. She didn’t want to inadvertently incur Zane’s anger again, especially given how that had ended the first time. In a kiss that she still hadn’t been able to forget even after a whole week—during which she hadn’t seen him once.
‘If it was forbidden, the door would be locked,’ Kasia whispered back, her shadowy figure disappearing round the curve in the staircase.
Cat raced to keep up with her, her footsteps echoing on the stone. They shouldn’t be doing this. But she couldn’t contain the shimmer of anticipation and curiosity—her fatigue forgotten—as they reached the top of the stairs and Kasia opened the door onto another chamber.
She heard Kasia catch her breath before she entered behind her.
Her own lungs ceased to function for two crucial seconds. Moonlight gilded the room in a silvery glow, but did nothing to disguise the staggering beauty of the gold-and-jewel-encrusted mosaic that covered the walls. A balcony looked onto a garden, the colours were muted in the darkness but the tinkle of water from the fountains and the heady perfume of the flowers convinced Cat it would look magnificent in the daylight.
Kasia flung her arms wide and twirled in a circle in the centre of the room, laughing softly. ‘This is the Queen’s salon. I have heard many tales of it, but I have never seen it for myself.’
‘How do you know that?’ Cat whispered, wishing Kasia would keep her voice down. Wasn’t this private? They really shouldn’t be here, she was sure of it now, even if the staggering artistry of the chamber was hard to resist.
